Please, tell us who you are and where you work at.
I am Everton Zanella Alvarenga, also known as Tom. I am at the moment working for Wikimedia Foundation and Open Knowledge Foundation. For the first organization, I coordinate the Wikipedia Education Program in Brazil (see Wikipédia na Universidade). For Open Knowledge Foundation, I am coordinating the founding of the local chapter (see OKFN Brasil - Rede pelo Conhecimento Livre <http://br.okfn.org>). I am really excited to promote open knowledge <http://opendefinition.org/> for a better research, better culture, better economy and better governance in the context of the free culture movement.
When and why did your interest in Open Access begin?
When I started studying physics in 1999 at University of São Paulo. I have noticed we, from the global south, could not have access to all the knowledge rich countries had and this disturbed me at the very beginning of my academic career (which I quit). When I have abandoned my research on elementary particle physics (2006), I have co-created a social netoworking platform for University of São Paulo, the Stoa project, whose main aim was to provide open educational resources and try to make the university a member of the Open Course Ware Consortium. At this time I began to understand better the movement for improving access to information in different fields, like science (see the Budapest Open Access Initiative) and education (see the Cape Town Open Education Declaration). During this time I gor also involved with Wikimedia Brasil activities (2008), mainly focusing on education and later politics. On governance, I began to participate of the Transparência Hackers community, where we have more than one thousand people brainstorming on how to use technology to improve democracy and help to solve my society problems. Through a work that started with the project Adopt an Alderman, inspired by my experience with the wiki world and together with friends from Transparência Hackers, I have brought the idea to the City Council of São Paulo to opening up its data following the Open Knowledge Foundation recommendations.
How would you describe your current role within the OA movement?
I hope the local group of the Open Knowledge Foundation I am helping to form will have a strong working group on Open Science. I do think my friend Alexandra Abdo will help us to form a community here and gather academics and interested people to foster access to scientific knowledge in Brazil. My role will be to gather and articulate people to make things happen.
How do you define OA? (free of cost v. open licensed or both?
Access to knowledge produced at universities following the open definition: http://opendefinition.org/ I also think possible people outside universities to produce academic knowledge, mainly know inthe digital age and when we will have a real commons of knowledge available to everyone.
What route to OA do you prefer or support and why? (Gold road v. green road)
To be honest, I have not studied yet which method is better and I do not have time to do it now. This can be an interesting debate and further analysis and case studies are necessary.
Are you involved in any specific OA project? If so, can you tell us some about it.
I will support the formation of a working group like this one http://science.okfn.org/ here in Brazil. I am in São Paulo, the biggest producer of scientific knowledge in my country, thus I will concentrate my efforts here, but always aiming my whole nation.
How do you see scholarly publishing in Brazil? What is the cycle and incentives? (if you know, please compare to the USA scenario)
I cannot compare in full details. But my short (and very restricted) view of scholarly publishing in Brazil is that we are not that original and try to follow the trends we have mainly in USA and Europe. The incentives seem to be the traditional publish or perish. From friends description and a short experience abroad doing research, unfortunatly here the scientific environment is mediocre and it will take a long time to this change. Fight for power is a big issue where I have studies and it seems, again from friends description doing research in other universities, a problem everywhere in the country.
Why do you think open access policies have faced so many barriers in Brazil? (Here I refer to bills proposed and archived)
Again, with my short and very restricted experience, it seems most academics are not aware of the importance of open access. On one side, it is natural for those limited to the publish or perish life it can be really difficult to do other things outside the publication of paper, mainly if you have an environment where you have to waste your time with small issues, like the fight for power I mentioned above. We also do not have the necessary skill to manage efficiently the public money, as happens in most sectors of the country.
What do you see in terms of institutional open access policies in Brazil? Are there institutional policies mandating OA in Brazil or in Brazilian institutions? (Here I refer to university or other policies, proposed and/or implemented)
There is a shy movement for that, yes. And people sometimes think open access mean simply access to the content online, which is wrong, in my opinion.
What is the role of Universities in OA in Brazil, and what should that role be in order to foster OA?
I think universities could take the lead on that, but I am afraid we have only a few people on our academia aware of that. I hope the young generation that was born in the digital age will help to change that.
What is the role of Libraries in OA in Brazil, and what should that role be in order to foster OA?
I do not know their role in the open access movement we have here, but I am quite sure they will be fundamental. We have to open access to everybody in the country, mainly the knowledge produced with public money.
Who do you consider the main allies of OA in Brazil?
We have some individuals in the country doing some good initiatives for open access, although, again, I am afraid some of these people do not analyse with the needed care issues like licensing. Carolina Rossini knows better than me the best groups and individuals supporting open access in Brazil.
Who do you consider the main opponents of OA in Brazil?
Those in power who wants to keep it for themselves. Please, see this great manifesto supporting open access. I think it says it all: http://openaccessmanifesto.org/
Do you know how much the government invests every year in public research? If so, what is the number you have?
No, I do not. I think a quick research is enough to discover that.
What is the role of government agencies in Brazil and what should be their role in regard to fostering OA?
A few days ago I went to a debate at FAPESP (funding agency of São Paulo state, the richest in the country) and it seems they have good initiatives supporting open access. I haven't followed each agency in detail, but I think there are people trying to open access with the natural barriers explained before.
What are the main barriers to OA in Brazil? Are those different regarding international and national journals?
In a smaller scale, I think the main barriers are the same. I think we don't have the skills to make things happen as quickly as in US and Europe, in term of infrastructure. This can be a barrier. Likely abroad those in power are stronger, thus it will not be easy to open access. This will also depends on the civil society and academics articulation, which I believe can be better in other countries than in mine, where most people are simply apathetic.
Is there a supporting community for OA in Brazil?
I small community or a collection of group, is my feeling. When they begin to work together, the support will be better.
What were/are the main community driven activities or manifestos prol OA in Brazil?
In Brazil things tend to happen when São Paulo take the lead. I ahve discovered great initiatives supporting open access in Brazil, but in less visible states, thus I think things will need to happen in the economicaly most powerful state.
Is there technical structure supporting OA flourishing in Brazil? Is there attention to open standards and interoperability standards for a repository infrastructure?
Yes, there is some. Carolina Rossini knows it better than me.
Are publishers open to OA in Brazil?
Yes, I think.
What is the role of institutions such as IBICT and SciELO in Brazil?
I don't have enough knowledge to answer this without having a general panorama about the actual state of things.
Please, let me know if you suggest other folks I could also interview.
I suggest you to interview professor Rafael Pezzi <rafael.pezzi@ufrgs.br>, Joao Marcos (UFRN) <botocudo@gmail.com>, Ruy de Queiroz (UFPE) <ruy@cin.ufpe.br>, João Barata (USP) and Francisco Antonio Doria (UFRJ) <famadoria@gmail.com> in this order of preference.
